


Change Our Way

by clutzycricket



Category: A Song of Ice and Fire - George R. R. Martin, Daredevil (TV), Harry Potter - J. K. Rowling, The Defenders (Marvel TV)
Genre: Alternate Universe, Crack Treated Seriously, F/M, Parent Teacher Meetings, Soulmate-Identifying Marks, Tumblr Ask Box Fic
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2016-06-04
Updated: 2016-07-08
Packaged: 2018-07-12 03:43:01
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 3
Words: 2,901
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/7084288
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/clutzycricket/pseuds/clutzycricket
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>(AKA The Tumblr Ask Box One-Shots, which do make sense as stories but are hell to tag.)</p><p>Story One: Meetings while waiting for your friend to get released from jail can get a bit tense when magic is involved. (Claire, it could be worse.)</p><p>Story Two: Sirius attending a parent-teacher conference for his godson...</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. bail, Claire Temple, Sirius Black

Sirius Black was used to being the one outside the bars, and even knowing that his mother-in-law had delicately threatened to disembowel the Ministry before he’d been in Azkaban an hour, he still got a bad case of the twitches whenever he had to confront the prospect.

“Detective Diaz?” he said politely, keeping his hands in his pockets. There was still engine grease on them, anyway, he’d been trying to work out a kink in the bike when he’d gotten the call. Nelson, their next door neighbor, had agreed to get Harry to school for some of Rhae’s Romantic Times test muffins. 

The small woman, who reminded him terribly of a honey badger for some reason, looked up. “You’re married to the woman who punched that Humanity First asshole in the jaw?”

“…That sounds like her,” Sirius couldn’t help but smile.

“Good news, he dropped the charges, since trying to assault a dying man is y’know, illegal. She’ll be out soon, with the other doctor.”

Probably TC, he thought ruefully. He liked TC, the other man was brilliant, but his temper was as bad as Sirius’ own could be. 

He sat down next to a pretty woman whose expression could only be described as “done”. 

“Fucking stupid doctors who think they know everything…” she was muttering, and between that and the scrubs, he was going to guess a nurse who had been involved in the mess.

“Least the charges were dropped,” he said, rubbing his nose. “Rhae owes me breakfast in bed.” And a few acts that he wasn’t going to mention in a police station, because hah, she called him the troublemaker, he was going to tease her endlessly…

“Oh, you’re Dr. Black’s pretty boy,” she said, giving him an assessing glance. 

“Prettiest princess,” he agreed. “And you are…?”

“Claire Temple,” she said, holding out a hand. He shook it.

“Hmm, Rhae did mention you… all good!” he said, defensively. She looked mildly terrifying. “Said she trusted you, which… you’ve met her.” His rabbit trusted next to no one.

She relaxed. “Asshole deserved it,” was all she said. “But they should have handled it better.”

“What happened?” Sirius asked.

She frowned and studied him, legs up so her chin was on her knees. “Can you…?” she twirled her fingers. His wand was up his sleeve, and a discrete wave left the area eavesdropping proof. “So, we had a patient who had powers, which, dude, it happens, this is New York, but we had a guy in Humanity First who’d been a fender-bender, and apparently someone with a minor demon of chaos. Stephen Strange- who I’m driving home, for some reason- tried to get rid of it with magic, but the asshole was trying to interfere with Black’s patient, so she cold-cocked him and went back to work. When he woke up…”

“Ah…” he sighed. Had someone let Rhae’s own status known? That would have been unpleasant.

Any further discussion was ended when a vaguely familiar man walked into the room, and when he saw Claire, his face lit up like Rhaenys confronted with a knitting shop.

Well, _that_ explained why Claire was driving him home.

Rhaenys, looking rumpled, rueful, but unhurt- well, muggles didn’t use dementors, thank Merlin, but he’d read the news, and Foggy promised to cover the case as needed- walked into the room a beat behind him.

He was running, he didn’t care, because picking her up was a brilliant idea, thank you, sorry angry Claire, don’t kill him later. “Idiot,” he said into her hair. 

She sighed, recognizing his Halloween Issues, as they had agreed to call them. “Your idiot.” She moved her head a bit, something he felt more than saw. “Oh, dear, that is actually cute. Scary, but cute.”


	2. parent/teacher conference (rhaenys/sirius

Sirius was looking at Harry nervously. 

He’d decided on muggle school because he was pretty sure Lily would come back from Heaven to rip his balls off if he didn’t, but he’d still been a bit nervous about sending a magically raised kid to muggle school. Not that he didn’t trust Harry- the kid didn’t run his mouth off, thank Merlin- but he was painfully aware of how the little things could trip you up. 

But Remus, with a slight hint of humor, had told him about Saint Cecelia’s, and he’d gone for it with a nervous sort of trepidation. Harry loved the school, though, talking excitedly about his classmates, music classes, art, and his teacher. 

Well, Sirius thought, he had gotten this aspect of guardianship right.

And he’d been happy with that, until Harry’d told him that he needed to come in for a parent teacher conference.

“I’m not in trouble!” Harry said, before Sirius could say anything. “Everyone has to do it.”

So Sirius put down a time he could come in, and reminded himself that he was perfectly capable for pretending to be a muggle for an hour.

The school was a nice one, he admitted, warm and normally full of kids being kids. Sirius had left Harry with Remus for this, and was trying to find his way to the classroom, wondering how the kids did it. 

“Hello, you must be Harry’s godfather,” came the low female voice, and Sirius looked up from his map. “I’m Miss Targaryen, his teacher. It’s lovely to meet you, he’s such a sweet boy, brilliant sense of humor.” There was a quirk to her mouth at that, and it was a very, very nice mouth.

Very, very nice teacher, too, with curling black hair and a small, slight form under an oversized purple sweater. He blinked. He swore he’d met Harry’s teacher, and it was a Mrs. Stark…

“There was a computer error, and as we like keeping classroom sizes down, Cate sent Harry and her daughter down to my room,” Miss Targaryen said, because of course he’d spoken that bit out loud. “It worked out for the best, I think- they tend to balance each other out- Sansa is a bit shy, and it comes across as stuck up, and Harry draws her out of her shell. In turn, I’ve noticed that she has motivated his compositions and reading work.” She gestured at the doorway. “If you’d come in?”

The classroom was decorated in a pretty seascape, words written in bronze along the top, and there was a big chest of pillows near a small bookshelf. 

“Harry’s desk is right here,” she said, pointing towards one in the middle, slightly messy looking and having a dinosaur drawn on the nametag. Sansa Stark was right next to him, apparently, with a tower and pointy hat with a scarf drawn on hers. “He’s doing quite well, over all- he looks promising at math, and with your permission I might look into putting him through a slightly accelerated program?”

Sirius tilted his head, thinking about it. “As long as it stays what Harry wants, I’m fine with it.”

“Lovely, there’s the unfortunate paperwork, but that’ll be at the end. As a… requirement, for the school,” and here her large dark eyes turned to mischief, “I wanted to know if there were any special requirements you neglected to mention on the paperwork.”

Sirius frowned at that. “I don’t…”

She held up her hand, and a bronze-gold gathering of light spilled from her hands in ribbons and sparks. 

Fuck.

“Wanded wizard, correct?” she said, waiting patiently for his brain to start working again. “Most of our students are from cryptid families, early presenting mutants, or somewhere in between. Harry’s refreshingly non…”

Sirius let out a bark of a laugh. “You heard the last name Black, realized I was from a wizarding family, and made the obvious conclusion?”

She blushed at that, pretty with her olive skin. “ _Well_ …”

“I’m the black sheep of the family,” he admitted. “We’ll call it a mutually agreed upon leaving when I was sixteen, and Harry’s grandparents took me in.”

They kept chatting for the rest of the block, until a small chirp went off and a regretful look crossed the woman’s face. “I have to prepare for my next student,” she said. “One of the Tyrell cousins, how fun. The girl’s sweet enough, but…”

He grinned. “If you would like, I could offer you dinner. As a chance to vent your frustrations in a non-murderous way.”

She blinked, tilted her head in a way that oddly reminded him of an old illustration of a dragon, then nodded. “That would be lovely. You do have a telephone, from the records, so…” She wrote her number on a piece of paper. “My first name is Rhaenys, not Miss, by the way.” Her grin was wicked.

“Oh, but the fun we could have with that, _Miss Targaryen_ ,” he said, the last in a playful growl. She was blushing again as he left, and he reflected that this conference thing had gone well, even if Moony was going to give him a Look.


	3. dance 'til dawn

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> soulmate au- anonymous

5.) “Griff, I’m fine,” Rhaenys said, very obviously not fine. She was a sickly grey color, with bruises under her eyes and looked like she was being held up by sheer stubbornness.

Her brother merely rolled his eyes, going to get them both food. “Seriously, Blackbird,” he said, using the old nickname Step Lysa had given her after an incident with a tree and a dare. “What’s wrong?”

“Mmm, just some nightmares,” Rhaenys settled onto a chair, watching as he cracked some eggs into a bowl and studied the contents of her fridge. He pulled out some spinach, peppers, and feta, waiting for her to add more. “They started last week, and I’m just trying to figure out how to kick them.” 

“What’re they about?” he asked. 

“God, I’m not even sure in the morning. Butterflies, once, red eyes, being lost somewhere, snakes… but that wasn’t terrible,” she sighed. “Snakes are not death in dreams, after all.”

“Unless you watched Anaconda right before,” Griff mused, a wicked grin on his face. “Or are on Jon’s Murder Dino Island.”

Rhaenys shot him a Look. And Aegon loved Jon, really. He was a complete failboat of a human being with the situational understanding of a concussed squirrel, but their brother was also unfailingly loyal and protective. And of course the ballet dancer would support the dinosaur trainer. 

Mind, Aegon was trying to get into the BAU and take a job that would probably eat him alive.

Yeah, he still had room to talk. And, he thought, watching his sister carefully, he’d go visit Bran Stark and ask if his brother in law knew anything that could cause this.

4.) 

Aegon looked at the house, which he’d sworn wasn’t there a minute ago. He then looked around at the New York City crowd, which ignored the house. 

Being fair, he admitted, New York was probably home to too much weirdness for this to be a shock.

He hopped up the stairs, knocked, and waited.

The door was answered a few moments later, and he gave a sheepish smile. “Hi, I’m Aegon Targaryen. I was told that the Doctor might be able to help- Bran Stark sent me?”

The man in the orange robes looked at Aegon, from his shockingly blonde hair to his black eyes to the slightly worn coat Sansa had been about to replace and the Romantic Times t-shirt Arianne had given him. He looked back into the townhouse, and smiled. 

“Bran sent us a message, yes,” the man said, a hint of humor in his words. What _had_ he told him? Hopefully not about the incident with the barn. He’d apologized, damn it. “I’m Wong, and please ignore…” He paused at the sudden thump, one he knew pretty well from the twin’s idea of a prank. 

Yeah, he probably hadn’t fucked up.

3.)

“I am going to murder my brother,” Rhaenys muttered, looking up from her phone. “Seriously, Nessa, I get to kill him after this one. Even Mom would forgive me, and you know how rare that is.”

“It’s sweet,” Nessa Blackmont said, proving that Griff had gotten to her first. “He’s worried, and Rhae, you know…”

“I know what?” The ice in the woman’s voice normally cut through anything, including Rhaegar Targaryen’s overabundance of enthusiasm on stupid topics.

“Oh, shut it, Rhae, you still keep the cards in your room,” Nessa said, proving that she possibly had no self-preservations. “Just because you are cranky about inheriting your dad’s weird shit, doesn’t mean it’ll ignore you, especially considering Griff and his bouncing. And Jon and murderous animals with teeth bigger than my head. Or Minnie. Or…”

“Fine, fine,” Rhaenys said, pinching her nose. “I need to go back to work- rehearsals wait for no woman.”

“Even the principal dancer?” Nessa grinned. 

“I’m expected to lead by example,” Rhaenys waved it off. “And I tossed the cards.”

“Liar,” Nessa said.

Neither of them notice the man at the other side of the cafe, watching carefully.

2.)

She danced with two very important thoughts running through her head- Thank fuck that they weren’t doing _Nutcracker_ again, and at least she could do _Nutcracker_ in her sleep- she’d been doing it since she started dancing.  _La Bayadere_ is wonderful, but when you felt like death warmed over…

She made it to her apartment wondering if she should swallow her pride and call Griff, ask what he was planning, but fell asleep on her futon with her phone in her hand.

The dreams took her then, starting with a familiar piece of music, one she heard often as a child- Bartok, she thought fuzzily, only the full orchestra version, not Dad and his cello in the study. 

That brings in the fog, something sticky and clinging and stinging, like jellyfish, and she wanted to run, heart in her throat and a low, simmering fury starting to kindle, because she wanted it **out of her head**.

Later, she’d wonder about how she knew there was something there, the red eyes in the fog and the feeling of completeness when she lost her temper.

 _Get out, get out, get OUT_ , she thought, burning firebird-bright, sun-bright. 

She fell off the futon with a bang, landing on a bruised hip she should have put Tyene’s balm on. 

There was someone in her apartment, looking rueful and holding… something… in his gloved hands.

“What,” she said, slowly, “the fuck is going on?”

He blinked at that, and the smoke-and-something he was holding writhed, nearly escaping. “Do you know how often I get asked that?”

Ignoring the fact that she was pretty sure that is what the words scrawled under her ribs in crimson lettering said, she sat up, crossed her arms, and gave him a Look.

“I _believe_ it is a Night Mare,” he said, watching as it took on a vaguely equine shape. “Though there were a few possibilities before this, I think looking at it makes it pretty obvious.”

“Okay,” she said, “but why are you in my apartment? The apartment I am pretty sure I locked, by the way.”

“Your brother mentioned you had a problem,” he admitted, “and I was going to knock, when I sensed the Night Mare. Given the fact it has been bothering you a week already…” He gave her an apologetic look. 

“I see,” she said, faintly. “I’m going to make tea. Would you like some?” 

He spoke a word that made the hair on her neck rise, and nodded. “That would be nice.”

Muttering a phrase in Spanish that would make Uncle Oberyn proud, she went to the kitchen. Kitchen unit. She didn’t spend enough time at home to bother with frills, especially with performance days.

He paused at her table, looking at the grocery list and note for Senya. “Did you write this?” he asked.

“Yes,” she said, tugging down the Citadel Company t-shirt she was wearing. 

“Oh, _fuck_ ,” he muttered, and she started **cackling**.

1.)

Aegon will be insufferably smug if he finds out, she knew. She was… _well_. Rhaenys was not going to blindly believe in the inevitability of fate. Dad running off with some pre-law coed when Mom was in the hospital because of some stupid mark had left its mark. So had the dissolution of Dad and Lyanna’s relationship, as quickly as it began, with almost as much pain. 

But Aegon, who, to their mother’s horror, had another Stark girl as a match, was happy, and Sansa suited him perfectly. 

It was part of the reason she didn’t trust the cards for anything but sharpening her questions, after all. 

But… it was nice, the odd dinner that worked with two crazy schedules. 

When Jon called and said there was something wrong on his Island of Potentially-Evil Dinosaurs, Stephen was watching with something like bemused horror as she pulled out the cards and kept up her conversation with Jon, tossing an absent spread and changing the path of the conversation.

“So what do you need me to do?” she asked her brother. “Not much a dancer could do.”

“I know someone,” he offered. “Write it down and I’ll handle it.”

She nodded, ignoring Jon’s protests that he just wanted to talk to someone about it, because if Jon was noticing, it had to be bad.

She didn’t know exactly who it had been passed along to, but Jon got to keep his murderous lizards, and there was an absence of dino-bites on her…

Yup, Aegon was going to be smug.


End file.
